Laurie was born a Mormon in Las Vegas in the 1960s. She suffered through sexual abuse, struggles with substance abuse and the conflict between her same-sex attractions and her LDS testimony. After choosing to sacrifice lesbian relationships for her religious convictions, she then fell in love with and married a man. They had 3 children together and are still married 20 years later. Laurie is the author of two books. The first, Born That Way?, written under the pen name Erin Eldrich, was published in 1994. Her new book, Reborn That Way, was published last year.

In part one of her interview, Laurie talks us through her high-school experience, including her first crush and self-medication, and she opens up about the factors that made it difficult, at first, for her to understand her attractions to other women. For her, this confusion was colored by sexual abuse, a cultural milieu void of homosexual role models and her testimony of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. This video is rough and raw in it’s style and fitting of such an intimate and off-the-cuff exchange.

(The views expressed in this interview do not necessarily reflect those of the producers of Far Between but are reflective of some aspects of what it means to be homosexual and Mormon today.)